Carter faces charges for marijuana possession in Winnipeg and
Saskatoon.

"I was really disappointed because I had just come off the heels of
going down to Florida and spending good quality time with him and his
mom,'' Jones said Wednesday from his home in South Pittsburg, Tenn.

"It's like when a family member or a close friend gets into a
situation like that. I'm really disappointed because I thought we were
a bit beyond that thing. It's something that we'll wait and see what
the legal process goes through and what the authorities say. Then
we'll have more of a comment on exactly what happens with Duron.''

Company is gearing up to include medicinal cannabis under extended
health-care benefit plans, helping offset costs for users

Sun Life Assurance Co. of Canada will become the first major insurance
company to add medical marijuana to its group benefits plans for
Canadian companies, a pivotal move in the insurance industry that will
help ease the financial burden for medical marijuana users, and a sign
of the growing acceptance of cannabis in the Canadian workplace.

As of March 1, Sun Life will include medical cannabis as optional
coverage under an extended health-care benefit plan. Sun Life, which
administers group benefits plans for more than 22,000 Canadian
companies, oversees health and dental coverage for more than five
million Canadians - including dependents.

A new medical guideline suggests family doctors should think twice
before prescribing medical marijuana to their patients.

The Simplified Guideline for Prescribing Medical Cannabinoids in
Primary Care, published Thursday in the medical journal Canadian
Family Physician, says there is limited evidence to support the
reported benefits of medical marijuana for many conditions.

It adds that any benefit could be balanced, or even outweighed, by the
potential harm.

"While enthusiasm for medical marijuana is very strong among some
people, good, quality research has not caught up," project leader Mike
Allan, director of evidence-based medicine at the University of
Alberta, said in a news release.

An advocacy group for renters say a city survey is needlessly pitting
homeowners and landlords against a vulnerable community.

This week, the City of Calgary put out their citizen cannabis survey,
which included data about how Calgarians feel about impending
legalization along with some pointed policy questions to help the city
as they draft new rules for weed.

The survey found that renters are more likely to currently smoke
marijuana at 32 per cent when compared to 12 per cent homeowners
reporting they currently puff. When it comes to home growing, the city
found that of those who were likely to grow marijuana plants inside
their home 68 per cent of those were living in rented town homes or
apartments. In Calgary particularly, the term renter has become a
dirty word - especially when it comes to the politics of putting in
secondary suites. The divisive term is often in the middle of council
discussions.

New medical cannabis guidelines for family doctors stress that they
should authorize marijuana for only a small fraction of patients
because many of its reported benefits have not been proved by rigorous
clinical trials.

The guidelines, published Thursday in the Canadian Family Physician
journal, warn that the number of randomized studies backing up the use
of cannabis to fight various ailments is "extremely limited or
entirely absent." The scientific evidence dictates that doctors should
recommend the drug only when treating a handful of very specific
medical conditions such as: chronic nerve pain, palliative cancer
pain, muscle stiffness associated with multiple sclerosis or spinal
cord injuries and the nausea and vomiting brought on by chemotherapy,
according to Mike Allan, a professor of medicine at the University of
Alberta and project lead for the guidelines.

With target date pushed back twice, government spokesman says there is
no need to impose time allocation in the Senate to speed up process

Ottawa is acknowledging for the first time that legal recreational
marijuana will not be for sale until August or September.

The federal government initially promised to legalize cannabis before
July 1, before giving itself until the end of July. Bill C-45 makes it
clear that cannabis will become legal at a date set by cabinet, not
when the legislation passes.

Late decision will push back legal sales of weed until August or even
Labour Day

OTTAWA- Canadians will have to wait until at least early August - and
maybe as late as early September - to legally purchase recreational
marijuana.

That's the bottom line now that senators have struck a deal to hold a
final vote by June 7 on the legislation that will usher in the legal
cannabis regime.

As recently as last week, the Trudeau government was insisting it was
on track for legalization in July. But given the Senate timetable,
Health Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor conceded Thursday that's not
going to happen.

Re: "Cannabis: City asks for public feedback" in the Feb. 7 issue of the
Nelson Star.

I want to voice my disappointment with this article.

We don't have a municipal business licence, but the Nelson Cannabis
Compassion Club isn't a for-profit business. Since March, 2000 we have
been licensed by the province as a non-profit organization,
incorporated under the Societies Act. The licensing and regulating of
which is the jurisdiction of the province.

Also in the Feb. 7th 2018 issue Pam Mierau says, "Our assumption is
they (medical dispensaries) will be treated like anybody else who is
looking to set up a retail store here, and they'll have to go through
the same process , and they won't have any advantage over anyone
else." "But we're not sure." Well, she shouldn't be sure as there is a
major difference between a recreational user of cannabis and a medical
user. It's called the Chart of Rights and Freedoms. Recreational users
don't have charter protections and medical users do. Even the
provincial government realizes this. If you look at their
announcements around the retail sales of recreational cannabis they
use the same term "non-medicinal cannabis" over and over again.

Why are people expecting to have marijuana-conviction charges removed
from their records and/or expecting compensation for any prison time
they may have served? They knowingly broke the law at the time.

I don't think any of them would be admitting to their habit if the
government were announcing that they were going to criminalize it.
Compensating people for breaking the law would be a waste of
taxpayers' money.

Public awareness of possible harm from marijuana use will be part of a
public campaign in the coming days as July approaches when the federal
government will legalize the use of the drug.

"We will have a public education campaign around the legalization of
cannabis," a spokesperson for the Alberta Cannabis Secretariat said in
an email. "However, the details of public education coming from the
federal government have not yet been finalized."

Federal government details are necessary first in order to ensure
there are no duplicated efforts at the provincial level.

If, five years ago, someone had asked me how I felt about cannabis,
I'd assume they were a cop. Even the term "marijuana" - a word
believed to be brought to the United States by Mexican migrant workers
before the Prohibition era, which was later used to promote racist
anti-pot messaging - was a red flag to discreet and casual users such
as myself.

Weed, cheeba, ganja, sticky-icky, dank nugs - terms the community has
appropriated from Rastafarians, West Coast hippies, rappers and Indian
yogis: These are the words that would have communicated familiarity
and, therefore, acceptance of the habit. But what do you call it now
that Canada has developed a sophisticated legal medical program and is
close to passing its recreational cannabis legislation? Well, from
black-market producers to young workers in illegal dispensaries to the
burgeoning, optimistic legal industry: We've all agreed to say cannabis.

The ongoing effort in the Senate to derail the passage of the Liberal
government's bill to legalize marijuana is not an exercise in sober
second thought, as its Conservative proponents claim, but an attempt
to obstruct democracy. The Trudeau government should use the tools at
its disposal to push this important legislation through the Upper House.

Bill C-45, the Cannabis Act, and C-46, which would tighten rules on
impaired driving related to marijuana use, have been before the Senate
since the Commons passed them in late November. And they may languish
there forever if the government does not invoke so-called time
allocation, a tool for curtailing debate that the Liberals have
largely eschewed.

Fentanyl. The drug is one that most people never even heard of until a
few years ago. Now it strikes fear into the hearts of public health
officials, youth workers, parents and others. A few grains of
fentanyl, often mixed with another recreational drug without the
user's knowledge, can cause death within minutes. It has caused
thousands of overdose deaths in Canada and tens of thousands in the
U.S., and those numbers are rising rapidly.

How have we dealt with this crisis? The primary strategy has been to
supply naloxone, a drug that can reverse the effects of fentanyl, as
widely as possible to police officers, health care providers and
others who are likely to encounter people who have overdosed. The use
of naloxone is a "harm reduction strategy", intended to reduce the
negative consequences of using fentanyl, and it has saved many lives.
But it is not enough. Overdose deaths from fentanyl continue to
increase even after widespread distribution of naloxone kits. We
desperately need another strategy. But what kind of strategy would
work?

Seth and Danielle Hyman with their daughter Rebecca 8, of Weston, are
seeking to have a strain of marijuana legalized to help prevent
seizures in their daughter, Rebecca, in 2014. Despite the legalization
of medical marijuana, Seth Hyman said the drug is still difficult to
get for is daughter. [Miami Herald]

When Seth Hyman first began to buy medical marijuana in Florida for
his 12-year-old daughter last year, he hoped it would be the answer to
fixing her life-threatening seizures.

That's the message city police drove home Thursday at a lengthy news
conference, painting a dark picture of a city in the grips of a
methamphetamine epidemic and the strain placed on front-line services
that are trying to contain the street drug.

"The emergence of methamphetamine that we're experiencing in our
community is getting to the level where it's starting to keep me awake
at night," Winnipeg Police Service Chief Danny Smyth said.

Twenty years ago this Sunday, when Ross Rebagliati was told he had
tested positive for a banned substance, he didn't have to ask which
one.

It was THC, an active ingredient in marijuana, and it was going to
cost him the first Olympic gold medal ever awarded in
snowboarding.

Three decades later, Rebagliati still has his gold medal, Canada is
five months away from fully legalized weed sales, Rebagliati owns his
own major medicinal cannabis supply company (the pun-ish Ross' Gold),
and snowboarding is a lot more mainstream.

Surrey mulls over 'missteps' from U.S. cities that have legalized
marijuana

Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner says the city has developed a "balanced,
appropriate and evidence-based approach" in preparing for the expected
passing of the Trudeau government's Bill C45 Cannabis Act this coming
July.

"Like all governments, the City of Surrey must determine the changes
needed to ensure an effective response to cannabis legalization,"
Hepner said. "Our report was prepared following a comprehensive review
of best practices in jurisdictions of the United States with legal
recreational cannabis markets. Council and I have directed staff to
implement the necessary steps outlined in the framework over the
coming months."

With cannabis legalization just months away, the District of Tofino is
considering a bylaw that would heavily restrict where pot shops can
operate in the community.

A public hearing is set for Tuesday. People will be able to weigh in
on the proposed bylaw, which would "prohibit the use of any land,
building or structure for the sale, production or distribution of
cannabis," according to a notice of public hearing on the district's
website.